Is Santa Taking Applications? ~ Vida Bonita

Is Santa Taking Applications? Because I'm about to start charging an "elving" fee. I love Christmas and I just can't help myself but be super involved in all of the happenings of the season. Not only have I done all of our Christmas shopping, wrapped every present with care (including hand made- yes I said HAND MADE BOWS!!!), baked with every ounce of Christmas spirit that I have in me, but I've also shopped for other people and sent out ideas a plenty for gifting ideas to keep every one happy. It may sound like I am complaining a little bit, but the truth is I live for this stuff.

I've been on break for a week now and I have loved every minute. I've cleaned off a lot of the DVR, as promised. I finished up my shopping. I've spent quality time with my husband. I even got to see my little Lo Lo last weekend! Last night we went to visit our friends Lonnie and Sara, and I got the chance to make up this holiday treat that was actually inspired by Matt.

I really just wanted an excuse to use this dish that we got as a wedding gift and I wanted to make something Christmas-y. So I used green apples, red apples, green grapes, strawberries, and marachino cherries and I layered them with cool whip in between each layer. I crumbled up vanilla wafers and put them in the bottom and the top to give some texture. It was deeeeelicious. And, not so full of guilt like a typical pie or something. Great food and great fellowship. 2 of my favorite things!

Continued to the next day...

Yesterday was a day and a half. I felt like superwoman, or at least got a dose of what Santa goes through every year with all of the last minute hustle and bustle in preparation for the big day. There’s little that I love more than going on a trip and then coming home to a nice clean home. So I got after it. All of the laundry in the house got washed (including all of the sheets). I mopped the floor. I vacuumed. I put everything in its place. Then, I took the box from the Craftsman toolbox that Matt got from his parents for Christmas and put it in the trunk. I then played Tetris with the Christmas gifts and strategically placed them so they wouldn’t crush the other gifts, OR smash any of my perfect (ish) hand-made bows. I’ve never been good at making bows, but somehow I figured it out this year. I honestly think that how the package looks it almost as important as what’s in the package. People like personal, pretty gifts. It’s a fact. Go look it up. In the words of my good friend Siva, “Google it, B****.” We have to be careful what we say around Siva, he picks things up quickly. (Siva is my friend in the Poli Sci program with me at Tech. He is from India and is often tickled by our American expressions. Just for the record, I didn’t teach him that one). Anyway, so I cleaned the house, packed the “sleigh,” and then I baked.

Have you heard of the website pinterest ? I have a conspiracy theory that Hobby Lobby actually invented Pinterest, because seriously, think about what their sales have to be since the development of the website. It’s out of control! Raise your hand if you have made something from Pinterest. Maybe soon I’ll do a blog dedicated to my Pinterest projects .Anyway, there’s also good cooking ideas on Pinterest. My roommate made these awesome chocolate toffee dessert things She said the recipe was on her Pinterest board “The Fat Lady Inside Me.” This thing doesn’t have many ingredients and so I decided to go for it. I should have taken pictures of what unfolded but I really couldn’t bring myself to add insult to injury. Plus, I was dealing with a crisis. I guess I had too many crackers on one tray, and there weren’t lips to the baking sheet. I don’t really know what happened, but I had this liquid caramel toffee stuff running into the bottom of my oven at a rate I couldn’t control. The smell also wasn’t fantastic. I sort of recovered some of my treat, but they don’t really look like what my roommate made. The good news is that I conquered the milestone of purchasing my first can of oven cleaner and now my oven is cleaner than I had started. That’s good news, right?

Check out all of the goodies that I made! This tray is for my Aunt. Making Christmas candy reminds me of my grandma, which I guess is why I’m so determined to do it every year despite all of the disasters. My aunt also makes Christmas candy every year and she always shows me up. I’m just glad I have someone to look up to and learn from.

I also made some treats for both sets of families.

Matt and I also did our stockings last night because we’re weak. Our Christmas day is going to be all over creation, so we wanted to do our stockings together. Here’s the pictures of our loot! Sooo fun!

PS- this is what I look like after a long day of cleaning. My apologies.

Pistol also got his! He got a rawhide candy cane that’s almost as big as he is. He keeps trying to hide it from us like we’re going to take it away from him.

Then to top it all off, I made my very first pot roast. I had to start it at 8:30 a.m. and it was finally done around 7:00 p.m. Turns out that Matt isn’t crazy about pot roast (who knew???). I thought it was delicious. We completed the meal with some of our leftovers from my holiday fruit dish. Yum!

Hope your holidays are happy and safe!